London's mental health services in crisis

Needs more than just more money

Max Marshall, Senior lecturera

a Department of Community Psychiatry, University of Manchester, Royal Preston Hospital, Preston PR2 9HT

In 1992 the King's Fund organised the first London commission on the future of London's health services. The commission's recommendations, taken up in the Tomlinson report,1 led to radical and controversial changes in London's health services. In Spring 1997, a second London commission will issue its recommendations on the future of mental health services. London's Mental Health, published this week by the King's Fund, summarises the evidence on which the Commission will base its deliberations.2

London's Mental Health is a comprehensive overview of the capital's mental health services prepared by its foremost experts. This giant document may be reduced to four propositions: first, that London has uniquely high requirements for psychiatric services; second, that psychiatric services in inner London are “near collapse”; third, that the reason for this collapse is underfunding from central government, arising from a failure to take into account London's uniquely high requirements; and, fourth, that the …